The result of our inquiry is that the Book of Obadiah was written at that time by a prophet in exile, who was filled by the same hatred of Edom as filled another exile, who in Babylon wrote Psalm cxxxvii.; and that, like so many of the exilic writers, he started from an earlier prophecy against Edom, already used by Jeremiah.[482] [Nowack (Comm., 1897) takes vv. 1–14 (with additions in vv. 1, 5, 6, 8f. and 12) to be from a date not long after the Fall of Jerusalem, alluded to in vv. 11–14; and vv. 15–21 to belong to a later period, which it is impossible to fix exactly.]
There is nothing in the language of the book to disturb this conclusion. The Hebrew of Obadiah is pure; unlike its neighbour, the Book of Jonah, it contains neither Aramaisms nor other symptoms of decadence. The text is very sound. The Septuagint Version enables us to correct vv. 7 and 17, offers the true division between vv. 9 and 10, but makes an omission which leaves no sense in ver. 17.[483] It will be best to give all the twenty-one verses together before commenting on their spirit.
THE VISION OF OBADIAH.
Thus hath the Lord Jehovah spoken concerning Edom.[484]
“A report have we heard from Jehovah, and a messenger has been sent through the nations, ‘Up and let us rise against her to battle.’ Lo, I have made thee small among the nations, thou art very despised! The arrogance of thy heart hath misled thee, dweller in clefts of the Rock[485]; the height is his dwelling, that saith in his heart ‘Who shall bring me down to earth!’ Though thou build high as the eagle, though between the stars thou set thy nest, thence will I bring thee down—oracle of Jehovah. If thieves had come into thee by night (how art thou humbled!),[486] would they not steal just what they wanted? If vine-croppers had come into thee, would they not leave some gleanings? (How searched out is Esau, how rifled his treasures!)” But now to thy very border have they sent thee, all the men of thy covenant[487] have betrayed thee, the men of thy peace have overpowered thee[488]; they kept setting traps for thee—there is no understanding in him! “[489]Shall it not be in that day—oracle of Jehovah—that I will cause the wise men to perish from Edom, and understanding from Mount Esau? And thy heroes, O Teman, shall be dismayed, till[490] every man be cut off from Mount Esau.” For the slaughter,[491] for the outraging of thy brother Jacob, shame doth cover thee, and thou art cut off for ever. In the day of thy standing aloof,[492] in the day when strangers took captive his substance, and aliens came into his gates,[493] and they cast lots on Jerusalem, even thou wert as one of them! Ah, gloat not[494] upon the day of thy brother,[495] the day of his misfortune[496]; exult not over the sons of Judah in the day of their destruction, and make not thy mouth large[497] in the day of distress. Come not up into the gate of My people in the day of their disaster. Gloat not thou, yea thou, upon his ills, in the day of his disaster, nor put forth thy hand to his substance in the day of his disaster, nor stand at the parting[498] of the ways (?) to cut off his fugitives; nor arrest his escaped ones in the day of distress.
For near is the day of Jehovah, upon all the nations— as thou hast done, so shall it be done to thee: thy deed shall come back on thine own head.[499]
For as ye[500] have drunk on my holy mount, all the nations shall drink continuously, drink and reel, and be as though they had not been.[501] But on Mount Zion shall be refuge, and it shall be inviolate, and the house of Jacob shall inherit those who have disinherited them.[502] For the house of Jacob shall be fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, but the house of Esau shall become stubble, and they shall kindle upon them and devour them, and there shall not one escape of the house of Esau—for Jehovah hath spoken.
And the Negeb shall possess Mount Esau, and the Shephelah the Philistines,[503] and the Mountain[504] shall possess Ephraim and the field of Samaria,[505] and Benjamin shall possess Gilead. And the exiles of this host[506] of the children of Israel shall possess(?) the land[507] of the Canaanites unto Sarephath, and the exiles of Jerusalem who are in Sepharad[508] shall inherit the cities of the Negeb. And saviours shall come up on Mount Zion to judge Mount Esau, and the kingdom shall be Jehovah’s.